This occurred in Japan, not the US, but it makes me furious! The teen actually committed suicide eight months ago and things are coming to light now. And of course, there are the stupid comments called the boy "weak" for not standing up for himself (when he was outnumbered most of the time!).

This article makes me see red and makes me want to cry. I don't care what kind of culture it is. Bullying should be UNACCEPTABLE!

_________________I will follow the path I want, not the path everyone else wants.

That is terrible. I tend to respect teachers, but there are surely some terrible ones out there. I actually had a teacher who was a bully towards me in the 6th grade. She really constantly humiliated me in front of the class for hardly anything. It is horrible because the kids most at risk for being bullied are the one's that need the greatest support of all. When kids are targeted from their teacher then it really destroys their self-esteem and makes them feel stupid and worthless. It also gives the other kids the message that bullying is okay. Worse, parents tend to not believe them so it can be really isolating. My brother was also bullied in grade school. His teacher made my brother sit in the back of the class facing the wall, all day long, for a few months straight. This was punishment for being chronically disorganized. Then he sent letters home to my mother saying my brother was a poor student. How can someone be a good student when they are placed in the back of the class facing the wall? My mother had no idea what was going on. The teacher was fired for another reason and the replacement teacher placed him in the front of the class. He excelled. Out of my 5 siblings my brother and I were both easy targets because both my brother and I were very sensitive and introverted as kids. My family was also very poor and we had lot of dysfunction at home. My other siblings were more extraverted and able to fend for themselves.

Good teachers should get paid high 5 figures, easily, IMO, while bad ones should be fired on the spot. And by bad ones, I don't mean the ones that aren't excellent teachers, but ones that instead of stopping bullying, are the ones that laugh and encourage it.

And as much as people seem to love Japan, it is a fairly militaristic in its schools and society, and it would not surprise me a bit if the principal and the teachers felt that the kid deserved it for being a girly guy and not being tough, and looked the other way figuring that it was for his own benefit to get beat up and taught to be a man.

Any teacher or principal or adult who says they didn't know bullying was happening is a LIAR. I guarantee at least one teacher or adult in any school knows when kids are being bullied. I'm so sick of seeing news stories about how kids need bullying education and get suspended and need programs to stop bullying. School professionals should have to attend these education seminars and should be help accountable for every instance of bullying that occurs in their schools. The adults are just as bad, WORSE than the kids, they are the ones that should know better.

_________________Just because you are offended, doesn't mean you are right.

As a teacher, I can tell you that many teachers don't know what bullying looks like beyond the blatant stereotypes of bullying (you know, a bigger kid shoving a smaller kid and stealing his lunch money). There are so many different types of bullying, and it even occurs among good friends (and can look like they're just joking around with each other), so if you're not trained on what it looks like, it can be difficult to spot bullying that is more subtle. I've been fighting with my district to get proper bullying training for our teachers because it is in an issue at our schools, but the most they'll do is just send out links to videos that don't cover the subtleties of it. But I keep at it because kids are so good at hiding it when an adult comes around ("Oh, I was just joking" or whathaveyou).

Another problem is how the schools handle it. Putting the bully and victim together to talk it out is total bull, but that's what our policy is (plus we have the "if it happens off campus, it's not our responsibility" policy which is total crap, particular with social media being a prime space for it to occur). It is so frustrating to work against a system like that because it doesn't make the situation better at all. Ugh, it just angers me, and I'm afraid at some point it's going to turn into a too-late type of situation that could have been prevented if proper steps were taken.

I know this happened in Japan, and their culture is a bit different, but it saddens me still that this kid was treated in that manner and that an adult, someone who that kid should have been able to trust, joined in on it.

This happened to me several times in school. The worst time was with a substitute. He was a really old guy. I was being bullied by the usual guy and all of his friends. They were stealing my stuff and calling me every word in the book... finally I told them to shut the f up. The teacher, who was ignoring the situation with a smile on his face the entire time, suddenly got angry and yelled at me "That's not very lady like!" and proceeded to yell at ME. The next day I went to guidance and said I couldn't go back to class (still the same sub) they told me that they couldn't do anything and to go back. As soon as I went in the guy called me a c**** (I never did ANYTHING to these people. I never found out why they hated me so much) told me to kill myself etc etc, while the substitute watched. I went to leave and the sub said something to them, "lol what a drama queen" or some crap. I wrote to the teacher and told her everything and luckily she yelled at them when she came back.

Adults usually do little or nothing to stop bullying. I went through hell from K through 12.

I'm with you Lizzi. I changed schools at 6th grade and was bullied mercilessly from then til graduation. Right in front of teachers all day every day. Never was anything done to stop it. It certainly wasn't ambiguous teasing. Once, after being beaten up in the bathroom, the principal had a meeting with me and my abuser. The principal's solution was for us to "stay away from each other" Ummmm, same kids in the same grade in a school of about 100 kids, yeah that's possible! ZERO punishment was ever given to the kids who bullied me.

_________________Just because you are offended, doesn't mean you are right.

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